I am new to prepping. I currently teach Hebrew/Greek at a theological seminary so I'm as green as grass even when it comes to basic survival skills. I can read the writing on the wall tho. I want to move my family to 12 acres in the country. about one third of the land is marsh. Is this a plus or minus in terms of living off the land?

A lot of edible plants naturally grow in marshes, if you ever need culinary variety, living by a marsh is a plus at least in my eyes, as long as you can have decent amount of planting soil in other areas of your property

Where I'm looking for land, any amount of water would be welcome. Even the few streams that cross some of the plots I've been looking at are seasonal, and most of the year they're dry.

When the SHTF, you'd probably be able to ignore any wetlands regulations and look at reclaiming some of that land for rich farmland, and turn the water source -- a stream? -- into a more useful irrigation or power (microhydro) source. Just don't try that while the EPA is still around...

Marshes may shelter frogs, turtles, various snakes, and other amphibians, all edible. There are a lot of food sources there (or can be cultivated there) as well, everything from cat tails to cranberries to wild rice. On top of it, marshes are very attractive to birds, in case you'd like to add some duck or goose to your diet. I'd view it as a net plus, given the amount of land you're talking about.

The Aztecs used to do pretty well growing crops (the famous 3 Sisters of N. American crops - maize, beans, squash) in a swamp/marsh environment. I don't think it looked like 'natural' marshland while they were growing, though.

2. Can you post a topo map from Google maps? (I've been looking too, and spend more time looking at topo than satellite maps.) Looks to me like there is a creek running east to west near the bottom of your circled area.

3. Water is good. Depending on the area, mosquitoes and raccoons would be implied. If you intend to raise chickens, raccoon defenses would have to be substantial. Trapping might be interesting...

4. Aside. Interesting on the Greek & Hebrew, I've dabbled a bit, helped for instance on a recently published NT Greek Analytical...

Marshes are wetlands, which are the object of special laws. The "dry" portion of the property may also be classified as a wetlands - if so you might be severely restricted or totally prohibited from any building or other modifications. For starters see http://water.epa.gov/lawsregs/lawsguidance/cwa/wetlands/laws_index.cfm (scroll down to bottom of page)

Secondly, flat areas adjacent to water are usually prone to flooding. Check the flood plain maps for the area.

Marshes are wetlands, which are the object of special laws. The "dry" portion of the property may also be classified as a wetlands - if so you might be severely restricted or totally prohibited from any building or other modifications. For starters see http://water.epa.gov/lawsregs/lawsguidance/cwa/wetlands/laws_index.cfm (scroll down to bottom of page)

Secondly, flat areas adjacent to water are usually prone to flooding. Check the flood plain maps for the area.

Ummm... borderline TMI. If it were me, I'd edit that post and remove the property specific info. I wouldn't want my location posted on the internet. "Somewhere in Michigan" would've been just fine.

I did take a look at the Terrain under Google. There really isn't any, nigh unto flat as a board. No hope of microhydro there.

I can't tell from the satellite pics, (tried Google, Bing, Yahoo and MapQuest) but it sure looks like a stream bed there that probably joins a stream on the north and west borders, goes west under the road and joins a that creek on the property W and NW of that one.

2. Can you post a topo map from Google maps? (I've been looking too, and spend more time looking at topo than satellite maps.) Looks to me like there is a creek running east to west near the bottom of your circled area.

Here's a link to a topo map of the area. There's no east-west creek bed indicated on the topo map, but there is a north-south intermittent stream about 600 meters east of Sparta Avenue in that area.

American parachutists...devils in baggy pants...are less than 100 meters from my outpost line. I can't sleep at night; they pop up from nowhere and we never know when or how they will strike next. Seems like the black-hearted devils are everywhere....